Rosemary Hart's Arc

Chapter 1 of 2

Rosemary waits until Brody finishes his coffee to ask for the one thing she never asks for: time. Not much. Just a day. One day to sit down together and figure out what comes next — the house, the money, the town project she can't stop thinking about. She unwraps a foil-covered chocolate from the bag on the barn workbench and holds it out to him. The silver catches the light coming through the door behind them. "One day," she says. "That's all I need." She can see the stables through the open door, the empty stalls waiting for horses they don't have yet, the kind of simple life she wants them to build together. Brody looks at the chocolate in her palm, then at her face, and she knows he's about to say something. But his phone rings. He pulls it from his pocket, glances at the screen. Dakota. Rosemary watches his jaw tighten, watches him answer without looking at her again. The chocolate sits in her open hand, getting warm. She knows what happens next — he'll take the call, he'll go handle whatever needs handling, and her one day will slip back into the quiet place where all her other careful wants live. She closes her fingers around the chocolate and waits for him to finish talking to someone who isn't her.